Benchmarking crime data for global cities

Matt Ashby, Michèle Grace Bal, Gonzalo Croci, Ashly Fuller, Nicole Mantl and Lee Youngsub

How does the rate of burglaries in London compare to the rate in Rome or Osaka?

Can we use the International Crime Victims Survey?

📚 not updated since 2010

no city-level data

💰 would be expensive to re-run

Can we use health data?

only covers violent crime

🔒 rarely publicly available

🗄️ not designed for measuring crime


👉 use police-recorded crime data/statistics

Problem 1: translation

🇪🇸 “robos con violencia en establecimientos” = “business robbery”

🇪🇸 “robos con fuerza en viviendas” = “residential burglary”


👉 translation by someone who understands crime data

Problem 2: what is this type of crime categorised as?

A person smashes the window on a parked car and removes money from the glove box, intending to spend the money on drugs and without the permission of the vehicle owner.


🌏 theft from a motor vehicle

🏄 auto burglary

👉 produce harmonised categories from published data

personal robbery business robbery

robbery, ATM location
robbery, bicycle
robbery, car jacking
robbery, clothing
robbery, delivery person
robbery, dwelling
robbery, home invasion
robbery, licensed for hire vehicle
robbery, licensed medallion cab
robbery, neckchain/jewelry
robbery, open area unclassified
robbery, personal electronic device

robbery, chain store
robbery, payroll
robbery, bank
robbery, bar/restaurant
robbery, begin as shoplifting
robbery, bodega/convenience store
robbery, check cashing business
robbery, commercial unclassified
robbery, gas station
robbery, pharmacy

Problem 3: city boundaries

Problem 3: city boundaries

Problem 3: city boundaries

‘Small’ London
London – 5km buffer

1,024 robberies
per 100,000 residents

London
 

858 robberies
per 100,000 residents

‘Big’ London
London + 5km buffer

785 robberies
per 100,000 residents

👉 create comparable ‘cities’ from existing areas with published crime data

Problem 4: different recording practices


👉 compare trends rather than point estimates

Published police-recorded data/statistics …

… translated appropriately

… aggregated to harmonised categories

… for equivalent geographic areas

How does the rate of robberies in London compare to the rate in Rome or Osaka?

Countries with human development index \(\ge\) 0.9

Cities (pop \(>\) 2.5m) with public crime data/statistics

How does personal robbery compare across cities?

How does homicide compare across cities?

Slides:
https://lesscrime.info/talk/ecca-2024/

Questions:
matthew.ashby@ucl.ac.uk

Funding thanks:
Metropolitan Police Service